Work In Progress

Notah Begay remembers watching Tiger Woods as an amateur hit balls for two hours in a downpour because Woods believed it would help him someday in the nasty elements of a British Open.

Woods was enrolled at Stanford at the time.

Begay got to see his college teammate's natural gifts up close, but he gained a perspective from the distance that day in the rain.

Woods may be blessed with rare physical gifts, but that alone doesn't explain why he is so much better than any other golfer on the planet today, and why he may ultimately surpass Bobby Jones, Ben Hogan and Jack Nicklaus as the greatest player who ever lived.

"My dad always said, `You get out of golf what you put into it. There are no shortcuts,'" said Woods, 25. "There's no crueler statement than that, but it's true. There's really no substitute for hard work. I know there are a few things I can still improve on in my game."

Hogan once said the secret of the game is in the dirt. Woods understands. It's in the mud, too.

While Woods may not beat as many range balls at tournaments as Vijay Singh, Hall of Famer Byron Nelson says no player works harder than Woods.

"Tiger puts forth more effort than anybody I've ever seen in terms of preparation," Nelson said.

That statement is remarkable when you consider Nelson grew up with Hogan in Texas and watched him practice countless times.

With Southern Hills Country Club and its distinctive doglegs presenting a confounding layout at this week's 101st U.S. Open in Tulsa, Okla., Woods will put his diverse shot-making skills to a severe test. In a bid to win an unprecedented fifth consecutive major championship, Woods has focused hard on his ability to work the ball right and left. He may have more shots in his arsenal than any other player in the game today.

Want to see a big draw? Woods has that shot. He showed it belting his drive around the trees at the 13th hole in his Sunday victory at The Masters in April. A high fade? It's one of his staples. A low, boring shot under the wind? Woods calls it a "stinger." He also uses it when he wants to hit a safe, controlled tee shot. He has a flop shot as good as Phil Mickelson's, and he can bump 3-woods from shaved banks around greens better than anybody in the game.

"What amazes me is that week after week, he's prepared," Nicklaus said. "There's never a slack. And that's pretty special when you can do that. He prepares himself very well for a golf tournament, probably better than I did."

That's why Woods is the only player in the history of the game to hold all four professional major championships at the same time. That's why he won the U.S. Open at Pebble Beach by a record-shattering 15 shots last year. It's why he holds the 72-hole scoring record or a share of it at all four majors.

"I don't think anyone has dominated an individual sport to the level he's dominated," Nicklaus said. "I'd come in a very distant second."

Woods is a cumulative 65 under par in the past four majors, 45 shots better than anybody else. Ernie Els and Phil Mickelson have the next best cumulative total among players who made all four cuts (20 under).

When a player is immensely gifted, there's a temptation to slip into cruise control and ride the gift. Woods may be more ambitious than he is talented. His commitment to be the best rivals the workaholic Hogan.

Look at Woods' body. He changed it with a top-secret weight-training regimen and protein shakes. A skinny, rail-framed kid when he joined the PGA Tour, Woods now struts the fairways with a sculpted, muscular physique.

Look at his swing. Woods was not content with his rout at The Masters in 1997. He overhauled his mechanics with coach Butch Harmon. He created a more shallow back swing and worked to keep his arms in front of the down swing, which prevents him from "getting stuck" and hitting shots high and right. When NBC analyst Johnny Miller pointed out that Woods' erratic wedge play was a major chink in his armor, Woods went to work dialing in a dependable short-range stroke.

While working through swing changes, Woods won just once in '98.

"That took tremendous intestinal fortitude to win The Masters the way he did, and then change his swing," Harmon told the Associated Press after Woods rebounded to win eight times in '99. "But he knew for longevity that it had to be better."

Woods was strong enough mentally in '98 to endure questions about what was wrong with his game. He never quit to revert to old swing habits.

"All I want to do is get better, and sometimes getting better doesn't necessarily equate to winning," Woods said. "I proved that in '98. I was a better player in '98 than I was in '97. I just didn't win as frequently. Then the winning came. So if you can keep improving every year, if you can look back on December 31 and say, `You know what, I'm a better player now than I was January 1,' then you can say the winning is going to come, and it usually does."

Harmon worked with Greg Norman for five years when Norman was No. 1 in the world and regarded as one of the hardest working men on tour.

"Tiger works even harder," Harmon said.

"He does a lot on his own. A lot of his practice is in seclusion, so no one really knows how much he puts into his game. He's just an incredibly dedicated young man."

Lee Trevino knows the difficulty players face trying to beat Woods in majors. In four of the six major championships Trevino won, Nicklaus finished second.

"I knew I had to work three times harder than Jack Nicklaus if I wanted to have a chance to beat him, and I did," Trevino told New York Times' columnist Dave Anderson at the Senior PGA Championship two weeks ago. "But these guys now can't work three times harder than Tiger does."